


Once Upon a Time

by Oak_Leaf



Category: Fairy Tales & Related Fandoms, Fullmetal Alchemist - All Media Types, Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood & Manga
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Fairy Tale, F/M, FMA AU Week 2017, Storytelling, the princess saves herself
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-26
Updated: 2017-07-26
Packaged: 2018-12-01 19:41:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,701
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11493384
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Oak_Leaf/pseuds/Oak_Leaf
Summary: The story of a girl, a tower, and an escape. Fairy tales have the tendency to mold according to the wishes of the teller.





	1. The Tale

**Author's Note:**

> A slightly more cleaned up version of the story I posted for FMA AU week on tumblr, under the theme "In a land of myth and a time of legend." I interpreted that as about legends and stories in general, and here we are.

Once upon a time, there was a girl who lived alone with her father.

Her mother was gone, and her father may as well have been too, for all the attention he paid her. Each day, he treated her with stony indifference, and locked himself away in his study where he was developing some form of magic, only to be seen at meals. And each day, the girl would watch her father, and hope. She was too resigned to wait or truly believe that he would ever change, ever actually treat her with affection or warmth; she prided herself on her sensibleness, after all. But the girl could hope and wish, pointless as it might be. She allowed herself that much.

Then, one day, it happened. Her father spoke to her. He called her into his study. The girl went in and sat quietly, uncertainly, and listened as her father said he had good news. He had finished the research that he'd devoted all those years to. He asked his daughter, "Do you know what that means?"

He would spend less time in the study, now? Or he would start another project? He would start to speak with her more often? Or they would no longer be secluded in their decaying house, away from the people of the village?

“No, sir, I don’t,” the girl answered.

“Hmph. It means there’s only one last thing for me to do. It means I need your help. I’ve completed everything, made all the arrangements, but to truly finish my work it must be protected. Will you help me?”

His gaze held hers, and the girl saw how earnest, how desperate he was. He needed her. He had spoken to her more in the last two days than in the last ten years. How could she say no?

“Of course, father!” she replied.

Her father smiled at her. The girl felt her heart glow, as warm and bright as any fire.

The girl was instructed to pack for an indefinite stay, and soon after she and her father set out. She was led deep into the hills and mountains, where no one lived. At last, her father declared they had gone far enough. He then used his magic and constructed around them a small room with one window, and the room shot up into a high, high tower. The girl peered out the window, gasping when she saw the land far below. The roof of the tower was just even with the tops of the tallest trees.

When she asked her father what this was, he told her that this was how she would help him. It would be her job to protect the secrets of his magic, and so she would stay with it and guard it out here. The girl stared at him, silently.

He would visit every three months, her father stated, to check in and restock her supplies. The only way up or in would be through his magic, so his research and she would be safe up there.

Her father squeezed her shoulder once—and she wasn't sure whether it was in thanks or good-bye or meant to be a rare show of affection—then he left. And she was alone in the tower, feeling like the warm glow inside her had died and left a pile of ash behind.

She might have regretted her decision, but there was nothing sh could do now. A few years passed, with her in the tower. The became all grown-up and turned into a woman. What did she do in the tower? Her father brought her books with her supplies, occasionally, when she begged for them, and she had those to pass the time. Besides that, she had created a slingshot for herself, and made a game of target practice with pebbles or sticks or whatever she could find.

It was the slingshot that set everything into motion that truly starts our story. Thanks to the slingshot, she met the first new person in years.

On a quiet afternoon while she was propped against the window, firing pebbles at the oak tree opposite from her, she heard something in between the _thunks_ of her shots hitting the tree. Leaves were rustling, twigs were snapping. It was the sound of something moving through the underbrush of the forest. The woman stilled.

Animals often moved past the tower. Maybe the noise was a deer?

It wasn't a deer.

A dark head of hair above a pale face appeared through the trees. The woman dropped down below the window and pressed herself to the floor. Outside, below, the stranger's footsteps sounded, approaching the tower.

A man's voice called out: "Hello?"

The woman kept silent.

" _Hello_? I know someone's up there. I heard you throwing things."

The woman hissed at herself through her teeth and gripped her slingshot tighter, frustrated at her own carelessness. Well, then. If he was going to wait for someone to appear, there was only one thing to do. She peeked over the window just enough to raise her slingshot and aim. The rock hit the man square on the chest, although she dropped back down before she could see it.

"Ow!" the man yelled. "There's no call for that!"

The woman urgently wished the man would go away and leave—but he didn't. He stayed down there, and continued calling up to her, and the woman wondered what in the world was _wrong_ with him.

Finally, the woman sighed and decided to stand. She glared down at him through the window. "Go away," she said.

The man was shocked silent for a moment, before he called back, "Well, you're speaking, anyway. What...what are you doing up there?"

She caught her breath and searched for an answer—something less juvenile than “none of your business.”

"Being annoyed by you," she managed to respond.

He let out a bark of laughter. "Really? I'd thought you were enjoying our conversation. Maybe it was getting shot by the rock that confused me."

She glared harder and didn't answer.

Despite the sharp glare that should have cut him down, the man kept talking. Asking her questions, trying to engage her interest. It was only after she walked away from the window and ignored him that he quit and left.

A week later, he showed up again.

She stood at the window and watched him, but kept quiet, not wanting to give him any more encouragement. Nevertheless, he persisted in yammering away, unbothered by the lack of response. It was amusing, the woman had to admit. It was something to pass the hours of the day.

He came back again, and again, and again. And when the woman's father stopped by to restock supplies, she never mentioned her visitor. She looked forward to the man's visits. He would discuss anything and everything while she listened, and somewhere along the way, she found herself joining  him in conversation. They debated history, discussed science. They compared favorite colors. She laughed at his jokes, and he faked affront when she teased him. The man shared his dreams with her, of how he planned to use position as a soldier to devote himself to making a difference for the better in the world.

She told him why she was in the tower. Or part of why she was in the tower, anyway. What she said was that she was helping her father in his research. And the woman was surprised when the man was less interested in what the research was, and more concerned by the fact she couldn't leave the tower. She had never learned her father's magic, so her father was the only one with access to the tower.

"But, don't you want to leave? To walk around outside?" the man pressed her. She didn't answer.

"We'll figure something out," he promised.

But there wasn't time for that. When the man next came to visit, he had to tell her that he had been called away to fight in a war.

This scared the woman. "Please...don't die," she begged him, in quiet words she hadn't thought he would even be able to hear.

Yet the man responded, and she heard in his voice the cocky smile that was meant to reassure her. "Of course I won't. I still need to see you, face-to-face, right?"

So they said good-bye, he promised to come back, and then he left.

After only a week had passed, the woman realized she couldn't sit there any longer. She couldn't simply wait and hope the man would return. He was a soldier: he would be in danger. Perhaps she wouldn't be much help to keep him alive if she was with him, but whatever she could do would surely be a lot better than sitting in the tower with nothing to do. He was her only friend, the person she cared for more than anything; she couldn't be without him.

How did she get out? The only way she could—by teaching herself her father's magic. The woman pulled out the research, and she poured over the notes and diagrams until she had learned just enough to create an exit for herself. She tossed then tossed the papers aside, wrote a quick note to her father, and set to work. As soon as she had made a staircase out of the tower, she left, running away without looking back.

She found a road and followed it, searching everywhere she went for the man. There were many long, long days of walking, and she only fell asleep when she was too tired to walk anymore. One day, she came across two brothers who were traveling the same road. The woman asked them if they had seen the man, and she described him to them.

"We haven't," the brothers told her. "Ask the wizard with a face like a gnarled oak, who lives in the north. He might know."

So the woman headed north to find the wizard. Then she asked the wizard if, with all his knowledge, he knew a way for her to find the man she was looking for.

"I do not," the wizard told her. "But I do know of someone with more power and knowledge. If you are brave enough to face it, ask the creature of Shadows and Eyes, who lives in the caves of the forest."

The woman set off for the forest. Gathering all her strength, and standing as tall and straight as she could, she marched into the caves deep within the clusters of dark trees. There, inside, she saw a strange, terrifying creature. It was dark and shifting, like a shadow, with glimmering eyes all over its body.

"Well, well, well, who is this?" it asked.

"Someone who has come to ask you a question," the woman said. She looked right at the creature and refused to be afraid. "I've been told that you have great knowledge."

"I do, but all things come at a price. What will you give me that is equal to my help?"

The woman thought carefully, considering what could be worth as much to the creature as the man was to her. Then, she offered this: She could give it the memories of her father's magic. But first, before it could take those, the creature had to tell her how to find who she was looking for.

The creature agreed to the trade, and laughed. Yes, it had seen the man, on the battlefield at the other side of the forest. It was the creature who had sent the armies that the man had been called away to fight. At that, the woman clenched her fist, but said nothing.

"Is he still there now?" she asked.

He might be. The creature didn't know what had been left behind from the battle.

Nodding her head, the woman allowed the creature to take knowledge of the magic from her mind, and then quickly left. She crossed the forest, running almost the whole time, and came out on the ruined space where the battle had been fought. When she searched, she found the man. He had been wounded, but it was nothing that wouldn't heal, and so she was smiling when she shouted his name and ran to drop on her knees beside him.

"I...I know your voice," the man whispered.

"Yes, it's me," she answered, joy almost overwhelming her.

She reached for the man's hand...and he jumped. He hadn't seen that it was her reaching for him. It was then that she realized he hadn't looked at her once. His face was turned a little off, and his eyes were staring into the distance beside her.

He was blind.

"Your eyes.... What happened?" she asked.

The man tried to apologize for not coming back, but the woman told him that didn't matter. She had come for him. She took his hands, and promised that she would stay with him, be his eyes, help however she could and he wanted. "I love you," she told him. When she leaned forwards and pressed a kiss to his lips, tears fell from her face and onto his.

Maybe it was the tears, maybe it was the kiss, maybe it was her declaration of love that did it. But when she pulled back, she saw that something wonderful, something magical, had happened. The man opened his eyes, and they were not the cloudy gray they had been only moments before. His eyes were bright and dark, and they focused on the woman's face. He could see again.

The man and the woman stayed together forever after that. He showed her the world she hadn't see before, when she was alone with her father and when she was locked in the tower. And she still acted as his eyes, when even with his sight the man had trouble seeing the path he had set out to follow.

And of course, they lived happily ever after. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm still not sure how I feel about this, honestly. (Should I have made it shorter? Kept it more the traditional fairy tale narrative style?) Originally, I'd meant this as just a retelling of Rapunzel. But as I was writing I ended up tossing in a lot of elements and tropes from other fairy tales.
> 
> The second chapter is an epilogue (of sorts).
> 
> Don't be shy; I'd love to hear what you think! And constructive criticism is more than welcome!


	2. The Teller

“Fuhrer, sir.”

Fuhrer Grumman looked up at the sound of the voice, peering over the golden heads of the two children propped up on his lap. “Ah, Mustang,” he chuckled. “Come to take them back, have you?”

Lieutenant-General Mustang smiled from his spot leaning against the doorway. “Fullmetal is about ready to tear the place apart looking for them, so, yes,” he answered. “I don’t think he appreciates his children being kidnapped, even by you, sir.”

“We weren’t kidnapped!” Lucas, the oldest Elric, objected indignantly. He squirmed his way down from Grumman’s lap and made a face, as though the very idea that he would let himself be kidnapped him was distasteful. “We were _exploring_ , an’ then Mister Fuhrer was telling us a story.”

“Yes, I heard.”

Grumman swallowed a laugh. Well...at least it hadn’t been his granddaughter who overheard. She would have had a word or two for him concerning that story, and none of them kind.

“The Lieutenant-General is right, I’m afraid,” he said, rising to his feet with a sigh. He carefully cradled young Lily, who had fallen asleep in his arms partway through the tale. “We had better get you and your sister back to your parents.”

“I can take them, sir,” Mustang offered, but Grumman waved him off.

“No, no, I enjoy their company. I’m quite good with them.” He shot a meaningful look sideways, which the younger man pointedly ignored as they started down a hallway.

He tried another tactic.

“So what did you think of the story, hm?” he asked, glancing down at the young boy walking between them.

“It was good. I liked the scary eye monster. Did you hear the story, Uncle Roy?” he asked, turning to Mustang.

“I did,” Mustang answered. “Although I seem to remember that particular story going a little differently.”

Grumman snorted. “Poetic license. Makes for a better narrative, this way. Besides, you wouldn’t deny an old man his ‘happily-ever-after’, eh?” Stealing a glance at Mustang out of the corner of his eye, he waited for an answer.

The smirk that crossed Roy Mustang’s face was small and quick, but there nonetheless. “If you say so, sir.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here you go, proof that Grumman is a die-hard Royai shipper. He's even composing his own AU fic, and everything.
> 
> The names "Lucas" and "Lily" are homage to Lady Norbert's MAGNIFICENT fan fiction works in The Element Chess series. Please, if you love FMA, do yourself a favor and read the gift she has given this fandom.


End file.
